Pages

Tuesday, September 16, 2014

Gettin' crafty

Yesterday morning, I had three miles on the schedule, so I went to the State Park after getting the kids off to school. I've been going there (and other places) a lot for running lately, because I was just getting tired of the same old routes from my house. The State Park has a loop that is a near-perfect 5K (it's 3.14 miles), so I like to use that for my 3-mile runs.

I had forgotten my heart rate monitor for my 8-miler on Friday, so I made sure to put it on before I left the house. Then, I drove 10 minutes to the State Park, and realized that I forgot my Garmin! Since it was only a 3-mile run, and it would take me 20 minutes round trip to pick up my Garmin, I decided to just run without it (gasp!). I knew the distance was 3.14 miles, so I decided to just use the timer on my phone to have an accurate time when I was done. (Because God forbid I make a guesstimate for once!)

I was trying really hard to run slowly and enjoy the scenery, but I had no clue what my pace was. At times, I felt like I was running ridiculously slow, and other times, I felt like I was going too fast (based on my breathing). I kept my phone in my Flipbelt the entire time I was running, so I wouldn't be tempted to calculate my pace.

I took it out at around the 3-mile mark, to get ready to hit the stop button, and I noticed I was really close to 30 minutes. I wanted to at least hit a sub-30 5K, so I picked up the pace--but it was too little, too late. Finished 3.14 miles in 30:18 (a 9:41/mi pace). Not bad for not having anything to pace off of, though!

Yesterday afternoon was a bit of a disaster. On Sunday, Jerry and I bought a nice futon frame at Goodwill (for $25!), but we had no way to get it home. So I asked my brother, Nathan, if he could pick it up in his truck, and he said he could do it Monday afternoon. Noah had cross country after school, and my dad had told me he'd pick up Eli from school.

I realized I forgot to give Noah his Gatorade for cross country, so at 3:00, I went to his practice to give that to him. Then Nathan called me to say he was on his way to my house with the futon, so I told Noah I'd be back by 4:00 to pick him up, and I went home to meet Nathan. He brought the futon, and we wrangled it into the house, and then he left because he had an 18-mile run to do. Just before I was going to leave to pick up Noah, I decided to call my dad to double check that he had picked up Eli.

Turns out my dad was fishing! He forgot to tell me that he wouldn't be picking Eli up after all.

It was too late for ME to pick up Eli, so I had to wait for him to get home on the bus, which arrives at around 4:00. Noah's practice ended at 4:00, and Jerry was at work. Nathan was gone, my dad was fishing, my mom was 40 minutes away. This has never happened before, and I panicked for a minute. I either had to stay and wait for Eli, making Noah wonder where I was while the other kids left, or go get Noah, and Eli would arrive to an empty house.

Then I remembered that Noah's friend was on the team, so I sent a text to his mom to see if she could wait with Noah until I could get there. She said she could do one better, and her husband picked up the boys and drove Noah home after practice. So I was here when Eli got home, and everything worked out fine in the end, but it was pretty crazy for a little while.

Nathan drove up near his girlfriend's house to do his 18-miler, otherwise I would have planned to meet him during the run and refill his water and all that. He set up the live tracking on his Garmin and sent me a link, so that I could see how he was doing.

I called his girlfriend and suggested that she go meet Nathan at around mile 12 or so, because he'd be really surprised to see her, and she thought that was a great idea. We didn't know his exact route, so I was watching the live tracking and trying to figure out about where she could meet him. At mile 9, he turned around to do an out-and-back, so that made it easy! She met up with him before mile 13, bringing ice water. Ice water during a long run is so good!

Nathan had an AWESOME 18-miler. That was his longest distance run to date, and he held a 9:09/mi average pace! The live tracking is a really cool feature on the new Garmins that I really should use more often. Nathan is going to use it during the marathon so that we can find him along the course. I'm going to try and make it to miles 8, 15.5, 19, 22.5, and then the finish line. It's going to be close getting from 22.5 to the finish line before Nathan, but I'll try!

This afternoon, I was really in the mood to make some sort of craft, so I went to Hobby Lobby for some beads. I'm going to try to replicate a purse that my sister has. Here is a picture of hers:

It'll be a big, tedious project, but I love that purse! I actually took that picture in 2010 with plans of making one, but just never got around to it. She bought it at a Goodwill store, and said she gets compliments on it every time she uses it.

I wasn't able to find some of the matte beads, so I'm going to wait until I get them before I start on it. But I bought some fabric paint and a couple of t-shirts, and when I got home, I got to work making a couple of Runs for Cookies shirts (for no particular reason at all).

Lettering with fabric paint was a thousand times faster and easier than doing fabric lettering and ironing/sewing them on. The other shirt I made is a long-sleeved black t-shirt, with the same "Runs for Cookies" letting on the front. I'm hoping that the paint holds through the washing machine; if it does, I'll probably stencil a couple of tech shirts for races. (The ones I did today were just $3 cotton shirts.)

I was supposed to run four miles today, but I'm going to do it tomorrow instead. Jerry is off work tomorrow, and he said he wanted to run with me, so I just switched my rest day to today instead. Running with company sounds much better!

Good job on the run without your Garmin! And I know that feeling of anxiety when your child may or may not have someone there to pick them up after school or practice! Very stressful! Glad it worked out for you! I use the runkeeper app as well. My Garmin is the old chunky Forerunner 201 and seems to work when it wants to so I quit using it. I find the runkeeper very accurate. It speaks the current pace, average pace, distance, or none if you'd rather not know. You choose the settings you prefer. I like it and use it daily and the best part IT'S FREE! Keep up the good work!

Nice garmin-less run. I just learned that Road ID has a free app that drops "e-crumbs" so a friend can keep an eye on you for safety and it will alert a preselected person if you should stop running for too long so they can check on you. (First the app will sound an alert for you to shut off - if you don't respond to the alert that's when it'll text the person.)

I'd love to hear from you! I read all of my comments, and if you have a question, I do my best to respond; sometimes, however, I get busy and forget to go back to reply, so if it's important, just email me! :)

Weight Stats

RUNNING

_______________________

Current Running Schedule

Mon- rest

Tue- Speed work

Wed- Easy run

Thu- rest

Fri- Easy run

Sat- Easy run

Sun- Long run

After training hard and running my best 10K this year, I am taking it easy through the summer. I run following the 80/20 Running ratio. For my easy runs, I use a heart rate monitor to keep my heart rate in the "easy" zone.

Amazon.com Widgets
Runs for Cookies is a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking to Amazon.com. (Basically, this means that if you click a link to Amazon through my site and buy something, I may earn a commission).

Privacy Policy

Runs for cookies does not share personal information with third-parties nor do we store information we collect about your visit to this blog for use other than to analyze content performance through the use of cookies, which you can turn off at anytime by modifying your Internet browser's settings. We are not responsible for the republishing of the content found on this blog on other Web sites or media without our permission. This privacy policy is subject to change without notice.